Stand by for the resurrection of boxing at the Fabulous Forum

From Bobby Chacon to Thomas Hearns to Alexis Arguello to Julio Cesar Chavez to Ruben Olivares to George Foreman to Ken Norton and Muhammad Ali, the list of great fighters to have thrown down at the Fabulous Forum over the decades is almost hard to believe. We could go on and on with that list, but it might fill this entire space.

Several promoters staged big shows there after it opened at the end of 1967. The last was Forum Boxing Inc. — operated by late Lakers owner Dr. Jerry Buss. When it decided to close boxing business in 1999, it was a blow. Forum Boxing put on two solid cards a month on Monday nights, and would also have that bigger Saturday world-title type of event.

There have been a couple of cards there since then that were sparsely attended. But for the most part, boxing there has been gone for 15 years. Color yours truly stoked that it could be back in a big way.

Longtime promoter Bob Arum, who has co-promoted fights at the Forum, will promote the May 17 welterweight title-elimination bout there between the legendary Juan Manuel Marquez of Mexico and tough guy Mike Alvarado of Denver (on HBO). The winner is slated to fight the winner of the April 12 welterweight title fight between Manny Pacquiao and Timothy Bradley (on HBO pay-per-view).

Arum played host to a news conference at the refurbished Forum on Wednesday. He talked about the future he sees for it, how big of a part he wants to play, and his hope that he’s not the only one trying to resurrect boxing in the 17,500-seat arena.

“Well, I’m very excited,” Arum said. “You see, one of the advantages of being around this sport so long is, yeah, you get old but you have so many memories and you remember what was important. And I’ll never forget this building and how important it was for the sport of boxing.

“Whether it was Marquez or Julio Cesar Chavez Sr., who beat Roger Mayweather here in this building (in May 1989), and Michael Carbajal and Chiquita Gonzalez and (Rafael) Ruelas coming back and beating (Freddie) Pendleton. I mean, what great memories.”

Arum was speaking of a February 1994 card at the Forum headlined by the second of three Carbajal-Gonzalez fights. The semi-main event was Ruelas challenging Pendleton for his lightweight title. Ruelas was decked twice in the first and looked like he would not get out of the round.

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Ruelas did, and went on to a rousing 12-round decision to wrest away Pendleton’s belt in absolute courageous fashion.

This is the kind of stuff Arum wants to see again at a place where Arguello knocked out Olivares in the third round in November 1974 in a featherweight world title fight. Only seven months later, Olivares was again champion when he stopped Chacon in the second round at the Forum.

Nothing wrong with trying to bring back some thrills to a place where there have been so many. We applaud Arum. He wants to stage more big fights there, but he’s going to need help with this rebirth.

“I don’t believe in exclusive deals,” Arum said. “Nothing would please me more if other promoters made use of this facility and put on matches that would appeal to the fans. I think that’s the way I was brought up. I did so many matches at Madison Square Garden, but never on an exclusive basis.”

Not only did the Forum play host to established stars, future Hall of Famers like Marquez and Marco Antonio Barrera and Gonzalez (already in the Hall of Fame) made their bones there.

That’s not to mention that Chavez defended two titles there — with a sixth-round TKO win over Ruben Castillo in April 1985 at super featherweight, and a 10th-round TKO over Mayweather to win the super lightweight belt in May 1989.

Which brings us to Arum’s next big fight at the Forum. He is working on that being former middleweight champion Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. against current middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin in July.

Arum, who promotes Chavez, and Tom Loeffler — an executive for K2 Promotions, Golovkin’s promoter — told us Wednesday that fight is near being done.

“We’re getting close,” Arum said. “And it means a lot to Chavez to fight in this building because as a boy he remembers his father fighting here.”

To have back-to-back fights of the magnitude of Marquez-Alvarado and Chavez Jr.-Golovkin after 15 years of nothing is a lot to ask for. Looks like Arum is going to give us that.

Pacquiao not upset

There was a conference call this week with Pacquiao and Arum, who promotes both Pacquiao and Bradley. Considering the controversy over his first fight in June 2012 with Bradley, who was somehow judged a split-decision winner even though everyone else in the world had Pacquiao winning, Pacquiao was calm when the subject was broached.

“I’m not angry after the decision,” Pacquiao said. “The officials did their best and no one is perfect in this world and sometimes they make mistakes. It’s part of boxing. I wasn’t really bothered about it after the fight. When I went home, most of the people were not negative — they were positive about the fight — most of them thought I won the fight.”

Arum said it’s all moot.

“Manny is a pretty sensible guy,” he said. “That decision was two years ago, you are not going to change the decision, you just go on with your life and you do the best you can in the fight that will take place on April 12.

“It was what it was and now you move on. Duane Ford is no longer judging. C.J. Ross retired in disgrace after another crazy decision and hopefully the Nevada commission will appoint judges from all over the world for this fight that will give a fair result if the fight doesn’t end in a knockout.”

Ford and Ross scored Bradley the winner by the same 115-113 score. Jerry Roth had it 115-113 for Pacquiao. This newspaper and many others had it 116-112 for Pacquiao.

Arum said he expects to Nevada State Athletic Commission to name judges and the referee at its next meeting.

Etc.

Locals should be thrilled that Chris Arreola is going to again fight for a heavyweight championship when he takes on Bermane Stiverne at USC’s Galen Center on May 10 (on ESPN). America hasn’t even hosted a heavyweight title fight in nearly five years, or since Arreola challenged and lost to Vitali Klitschko in September 2009 at Staples Center. His reputation for hating to train notwithstanding, he showed what he can do when he does when he knocked out Seth Mitchell in the first round in September. He could win this fight. ... Sergey Kovalev (23-0-1, 21 KOs) of Russia tonight will defend his light heavyweight title when he takes on Cedric Agnew (26-0, 13 KOs) of Chicago at Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City (on HBO). ... John Molina of Covina will have a chance to put himself in line for another title shot when he takes on former super lightweight champion Lucas Matthysse (34-3, 32 KOs) of Argentina on the April 26 undercard at StubHub Center (on Showtime). A victory would put the hard-hitting Molina (27-3, 22 KOs) in the mix in the higher division; he previously challenged lightweight champion Antonio DeMarco for his title but was stopped in the first round.